The worst pain I have ever been in. A week after my due date I started having contractions. I labored at home for almost 24 hours (was horrible and for some reason labor made me forcefully vomit every few minutes so I ended up being severely dehydrated, but wanted to do it as naturally as possible) and then went to the hospital where I went from 3 cms to 10 cms in about 3 hours. I finally caved because of the pain and exhaustion and had an epidural (no g and a here and I didn't want to be out of it, so no i.v. drugs) which worked for 3 hours and I was actually enjoying the whole labor experience, but then it suddenly stopped working (OH said he possibly saw it fall out when I sat up).
She was back to back, fairly large and the pain (especially in my back) was like nothing I have ever felt (NOTHING like period pains, and I have horrible, heavy painful periods). I wanted so much to have a natural birth (deathly afraid of operations and hospitals) so I tried so hard and pushed for 3 hours (no real progress, she just went down enough to start getting a conehead and got stuck).
Even though I am a bigger girl, apparently my pelvis isn't and she was stuck and wouldn't go down any further no matter what I/they tried. The doctor had his whole hand up me trying to manipulate things which felt like icepicks stabbing me. I really, really, really didn't want a c-section but finally had no other choice. I was rushed to the O.R. and since the epi wasn't working a spinal was out of the question too and I could feel everything, they had to give me general anesthesia which was one of the worst experiences of my life because no one told me what was going on.
The healing from the c-section is awful (maybe because it was so rushed and not planned???) I still can barely hold my lo (luckily my oh took some time off work and is helping me tons) and even walking hurts, but I know I have to. But all that pain is from the c-section, not labor.
All in all, labor was the worst pain I have ever felt and my whole birthing experience was the worst experience ever except for the end result. I am still so traumatized by it I have nightmares about it and wake up crying and because after all that I did (labor and pushing) and still ended up with a c-section I feel like I failed (even though in my mind I KNOW I did everything possible to have a natural birth and if it was 100 years ago, both the baby and I would have died).
I understand how people say they will never have another baby after their experience, but hopefully (or so I have heard) I will forget the pain only remember the wonderful outcome, my beautiful daughter.